Ross Miller: A prince who would be king

Tuesday, Ross Miller unofficially began his calculated campaign to become Nevada's next attorney general then, perhaps, the next Democratic governor of the Silver State.

Miller, Nevada’s term-limited secretary of state, began his day in Reno. He touted his voter-photo ID bill at a meeting of the Reno Republican Men’s Club at the Atlantis.

These Republicans were impressed that Miller would cross party lines and come to talk to them. Of course, he spoke about a subject conservatives love — fixing voter fraud — spending up to $10 million in Nevada solving a "problem" Democrats say doesn't exist.

Those at the meeting were thrilled that a Democrat shared their views on an important conservative issue.

Former GOP U.S. Senate candidate Sharron Angle was also on a crusade about election integrity about a year ago. But it went nowhere.

Thursday night, Miller was in Las Vegas, according to a report by Nevada journalist Jon Ralston. He raised “six figures” while meeting with a wide range of influential and important people from Nevada’s biggest city, Ralston reported.

Miller has become the "Blessed Prince" of Nevada politics.

The Prince's career so far is a story book. Miller was first elected secretary of state at 30, the youngest person in that office in the nation at the time.

The Prince is the son of Nevada’s only 10-year governor and grandson of a “Chicago bookmaker with ties to the Outfit.” That’s how former Gov. Bob Miller describes his dad and Ross’ grandpa in his autobiography, “Son of a Gambling Man.”

With our state's gambling history, you can't get much more "Nevada royalty" than that, unless your name is Wynn, Ascuaga or Carano.

If Ross Miller sticks with his political career, and it doesn't include eventual election as governor, he will have committed a royal screw-up somewhere along the line.

MILLER breathes a competitive fire that any Republican will find tough to beat in the near future.

He picked that up from daddy, the hoopster. Gov. Bob Miller once pulled a young Ross Miller out of Carson High, partially because he didn't get enough playing time on the basketball team.

Ross recently used his family's competitive nature to survive on a diet of brown rice and fish as part of a training discipline for his first-and-only MMA fight.

It is an uncomfortable thought — potential future Nevada governor getting his brains beaten in the MMA. But getting in the octagon one time when you're young? Com' on man, that's spirit.

MILLER SEEMED like he was practicing for election season in Reno Tuesday. He stepped on his own joke once, but it was good experience. He won't do it again. Some of the GOPers threw him curves. He hit most pitches.

Some even said they would consider voting for Miller, the Democrat, in a general election.

“Absolutely,” said Kim Bacchus, a member of Nevada's national GOP convention delegation. “If he is going to come and present himself to the loyal opposition, that’s fabulous. I appreciate that so much.”

The crowd loved it when Miller ripped his own party’s knee-jerk reaction to his voter photo ID bill.

“There are members of the Democratic Party who are conditioned to think that it (voter photo ID system) means that there is an effort to suppress the vote or that this will result in individuals being disenfranchised," the Prince said.

When it was over, the Prince scurried to catch a flight to Las Vegas. He had no entourage.

He said it was wrong to think his Reno talk about the voter-photo ID bill was political in nature.

“I think it is (wrong),” Miller said. “This is something that relates directly to the office that I am termed limited out of. Obviously, it is a controversial subject but one I feel very strongly about.”

The problem with voter fraud, are the thousands of cases that are not brought to light due to the left wing influence over what constitutes profiling. Or much more basic, as whether we should be allowed to profile a group of people we have extremely strong reason to believe they are committing voter fraud, i.e. illegal aliens, convicted felons, cross border voting, and rank double voting, using multiple surnames that illegal's Mexicans can easily obtain.

I do not care for this article. I do not care for this politician based on what I have seen so far. His voter ID plan is about trying to fix a problem that he would have a hard time proving to be an actual problem. Most "evidence" I have seen seems to be from sites like the Dailykos or Dailypaul. Neither which I would accept without further sources to back them up. I did find one story about a woman who tried to vote twice, but that is one vote out of hundreds of thousands of votes.

About this blog

Ray Hagar is the political reporter for the Reno Gazette-Journal and a fifth-generation Nevadan. Hagar is also a co-host for the Nevada Newsmakers statewide television program. He is the co-author of "Johnson-Jeffries: Dateline Reno," a book about the 1910 "Fight of the Century" in Reno that pitted black world champion Jack Johnson against the "Great White Hope," Jim Jeffries